Preemie Support Group

When baby comes home

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mrmassengill wrote:

I have a long time until my baby comes home. He will only be two weeks old tomorrow born at 27 weeks. They said shoot for around his due date until he can come home which is April 22. Anyways I have not spoke with nicu about this just yet. I have only heard from another family with babies in the nicu and wanted to know from other moms with preemies. What did you do with your animals when you brought your preemie home ? This family is taking their dogs completely out of the house when their babies come home and keeping them gone for awhile. I have two dogs myself. And I would like some advice on what I should do so I can plan ahead. I want the best environment for my baby when he comes home. And I'm not meaning as in my dogs would hurt my baby. From what I'm hearing is no animals should be around preemies bc of health reasons. Not that they are in harms way. Bc that's not the case. I would love to hear from other moms. Of course I will talk with nicu about this also.

We spoke to the NICU about this. They said as long as the dog wasn't licking the baby's face they would be fine. We had our daughter at 33w5d and she spent 5 days in the NICU. Although our daughters health is of the utmost importance, we were also very cognizant of our pup. We didn't want him to feel like he was being replaced or forgotten. So we wanted to make sure he was home when we got home. He adjusted pretty well with her and likes to be around her but he hasn't ever licked her or been all over her. My daughter is now almost 8 weeks old and we haven had no issues.

I had 26 weekers. They came home on monitors and one still needed supplemental oxygen for feedings. We have two cats and the NICU never said a thing. They were fine. I imagine every situation is different, but I wouldn't plan to get rid of pets for the preemie reason just yet.

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